One of the principal concepts of Chinese medicine is that there are correspondences among various parts of the body. In pulse diagnosis the pulse on the radial artery can be felt in three sections reflecting the energetic states of the upper, middle and lower parts of the body. In facial diagnosis the face is believed to reflect the condition of different organs. In tongue diagnosis the same general principal is applied. Certain parts of the tongue reflect the health of the other parts of the body, or certain internal organs. The beauty of tongue diagnosis lies in its simplicity and immediacy: whenever there is a complex disorder full of contradictions, examination of the tongue instantly clarifies the main pathological process (see “Tongue Diagnosis in Chinese Medicine,” by Giovanni Maciocia, Eastland Press, Seattle, 1996).
Tongue diagnosis is a vital instrument used in traditional Chinese medicine (TCM) both for assessing the current health of a patient and providing a basis for prognosis. It also informs the practitioner about the underlying strength or weakness of the patient's constitution.
For thousands of years, tongue diagnosis has played an indispensable role in the practice of traditional Chinese medicine. TCM practitioners rely on tongue diagnosis to differentiate one syndrome from another, and use variations in the tongue's color, texture, shape, and coating to evaluate a patient's condition.
In the practice of TCM, tongue diagnosis is accomplished by visual inspections. Visual inspection of the tongue offers many advantages: it is a non-invasive diagnosis method, is simple, and inexpensive. However, the current practice in TCM is mainly experience based or subjective. The quality of the visual inspection varies between individual practitioners. And although there are a few experts successfully diagnosing cancers based on inspection of the tongue, their skills are not easily transferable to other medical professionals. Their expertise is limited at qualitative descriptions, not to quantitative or mathematical formulations.
Furthermore, traditional visual inspection of the tongue does not provide traceable fidelity information on patients' tongue appearance such as color, coating and texture, except subjective descriptions in writing.
Therefore, there is a need for creating a tongue diagnosis system that facilitates performing functionalities such as tongue image acquisition, recording, retrieval, analysis, detection, tele-inspection, remote access, and so on.
These and other aspects, objects, features and advantages of the present invention will be more clearly understood and appreciated from a review of the following detailed description of the preferred embodiments and appended claims, and by reference to the accompanying drawings.